Moses said to the people, “Remember this day, in which you came out of Egypt, out of the house of bondage; for by strength of hand Yahweh brought you out from this place. No leavened bread shall be eaten.
Not to eat anything leavened during Passover
The cited verse
The Hebrew (Masoretic Text)
וְלֹא יֵאָכֵל חָמֵץ
In Maimonides’ words
How Maimonides defines this commandment in his Sefer HaMitzvot — his own words, shown as a primary source.
הזהירנו מאכול חמץ בפסח. והוא אמרו לא יאכל חמץ ובאר שהוא בכרת ואמר כי כל אוכל חמץ ונכרתה אם היה מזיד ואם היה שוגג חייב חטאת קבועה. וכבר התבארו משפטי מצוה זו במסכת פסחים. (בא, זמנים הלכות חמץ ומצה):
He prohibited us from eating chametz (leavened grain products) on Pesach. And that is His saying, "no chametz shall be eaten" (Exodus 13:3). And He explained that it is [punishable] by excision and said, "for whoever eats chametz shall be excised" (Exodus 12:15)" - if one was volitional. And he is liable a fixed sin-offering if he was inadvertent. And the regulations of this commandment have already been explained in Tractate Pesachim. (See Parashat Bo; Mishneh Torah, Leavened and Unleavened Bread.)
Hebrew: Sefer HaMitzvot, Warsaw 1883 (public domain). English: Sefaria Edition, trans. Rabbi Francis Nataf, 2021 (CC0). Via Sefaria; translator’s footnotes omitted.
Literary form: a prohibition
Applicability
How the catalog describes where and when this commandment applies. These are independent descriptions, not a verdict on which laws still count.
- Recorded as practiced today
Classical halakhic consequences
The consequences the classical halakhah attaches to this commandment, grouped by who imposes them. Where a category has none recorded, that absence is itself meaningful.
Imposed by a court
- Lashes (malkot)
At the hands of Heaven
- Karet — being 'cut off'
Ritual remedy
- A sin-offering (ḥatat)
How the streams of Judaism treat this commandment
The streams of Judaism read the same commandment differently — an ongoing plurality, not a ranking. Each position below is reported as the catalog records it; none is presented as the correct one.
- Orthodox Binding
- Conservative Binding
- Reform As the catalog records it: custom recommended
- Reconstructionist Kept as an ethical principle
- Karaite Binding
24 of 613 commandments have been examined in depth so far — this one is queued.
How later traditions received this commandment
How later traditions read or reworked this commandment, each attributed to its own voice. The catalog’s own classification of each reception is shown as it records it, never adopted as GEBible’s.
Rabbinic aggadah
- Pesiqta de-Rav Kahana 5 expanded it homiletically
- yetzer ha-ra likened to se'or she-be-issah (paraphrastic identification; cf. b. Berakhot 17a) expanded it homiletically
Philo of Alexandria
- De Specialibus Legibus 2.158-161 rationalized it
Josephus
- Antiquities 3.248-249 affirmed it
The New Testament
- 1 Corinthians 5:6-8 read it allegorically leaven as 'malice and wickedness'; Christ as paschal lamb, unleavened bread as 'sincerity and truth'
- Mark 14:1 carried a parallel references the Feast of Unleavened Bread as calendrical setting
- Galatians 5:9 read it allegorically 'a little leaven leavens the whole lump' as metaphor for corrupting influence
The Church Fathers
- Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 14 read it allegorically
- Origen, Contra Celsum 8.22-23 read it spiritually addresses Christian non-observance of Jewish festivals broadly rather than a direct leaven allegory
Where this commandment meets modern human-rights frameworks
One modern normative lens, attributed to it — not GEBible’s assessment. Each row names the framework it measures against and the catalog’s own classification of the relation.
This framework catalogues tensions; it records agreement in only one of its entries. The near-total tension rate is the shape of the instrument, not a finding.
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general principle
This framework classifies the relation as an incompatible method.
The commandment prescribes malkot for eating any leavened food during the seven days of Passover; post-Enlightenment penal norms reject corporal punishment as a state sanction for dietary infractions.
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Article 7
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
Article 7 of the ICCPR prohibits cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment; judicially administered flogging for consuming bread or other leavened food constitutes prohibited treatment under that article.
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abrogated_in_practice
This framework classifies the relation as abrogated in practice.
Corporal jurisdiction lapsed with the dissolution of the Sanhedrin in the Second Temple era; no contemporary Jewish court administers malkot, though the de jure norm remains binding in orthodox halakhah.